I have been serving with a Before & Aftercare enrichment program, AlphaBEST, here in Montgomery County as a Site Director for almost 7 years. As part of supporting those students with that program, I help them out with Homework Help Time with understanding what they are working on with the homework worksheet packets from their school homerooms for the week and make sure that those things make sense to them and feel comfortable and less scary than they might have before. I also help them learn new things in 5 different kinds of activities about Art (ex. learning about different artists all over the world & how they made some of their most famous artwork), World Languages & Cultures (ex. learning how to sign in ASL or about different kinds of Chinese foods with Mandarin vocabulary words), STEAM (ex. how to make their own stop-motion animation movies), Fitness (ex. working on better aim with soccer goal shots), & Makers (ex. engineering a special invention to survive on a deserted island with a packet of materials), & Social-emotional learning (ex. how to handle your "big thoughts & big feelings" in healthy, safe ways with each other). Before that, I finished stints serving with the Peace Corps in Eastern Europe & low-income immigrant & resettled refugee children & families with AmeriCorps in DC from 2003-2006. I then finished my Master degree in Social Work with a concentration in working with Displaced Populations in 2008 and worked with youth in DC's child welfare system and completed additional play & art therapy training for 5 years before coming to work with AlphaBEST. My favorite part about working with students is getting to build safe spaces for youth where everyone is included and accepted for who they are for all they are and (like "Lilo & Stitch") where no one gets left-out or left behind. I also love watching that moment on students' faces when the challenging, hard parts with learning new things starts to click for them and they start to feel more confident that they can figure those thing out now, too.

I grew-up reading X-Men comics, stories about Robin Hood, knights, & the Boxcar Children with my 2 younger brothers and love cooking, playing with my puppies, and spending time with my friends in my time when I am not supporting youth in my programs or students that I am tutoring. I also started learning archery (shooting a bow & arrow), fencing (like swordfighting, but with a thinner sword & masks), & kayaking last summer and am excited to be able to start having fun with those activities again this summer. My favorite comfort food is Thai coconut milk soup. I also really enjoy catching-up on anime, books, TV shows, & stories that my students enjoy so that we can discuss them together and I can find ways to bring them into our learning activities together in fun, interesting ways.